Angle Bush founded Black Women In Artificial Intelligence in 2020, after walking into an event on artificial intelligence and finding almost nobody in the room who looked like her.
The organization now has members on five continents. It runs career development, technical training, AI workforce development, and peer support programs, and it lists partnerships with Amazon, Capital One, Microsoft, and NVIDIA. Bush was named to the 2026 TIME100 AI list.
She puts one question to members, and it is the argument in five words. “Are you in the lab?”
Almost every company in the country is running some form of AI training, and nearly all of it teaches people to operate a tool somebody else built. Using the thing and building the thing are two different jobs. Bush spends her time moving members across that line rather than congratulating them for showing up, and the question is how she does it.
She holds a master’s degree in administration and a bachelor of science in community development from Central Michigan University, and she studied history at Harvard University. She is a visiting fellow at the University of Miami and sits on the Central Michigan University College of Science and Engineering advisory board. She has taken the organization’s case to the New York Stock Exchange closing bell, to NPR, to Bloomberg, and to the National Urban League conference.
She is not the only Houston woman working this ground, and the other three come at it from different ends.
Ayana Elon founded Black Girl Ai, a Houston initiative that introduces Black and Brown girls aged 8 to 12 to artificial intelligence through hands-on learning. Dr. Reagan Flowers founded C-STEM and works on expanding STEM education and on connecting Houston’s technology resources, investment, and entrepreneurial networks into something a Black founder can actually reach. Delilah Bardlette, who runs Delilah Bardlette Leadership Solutions, built an AI-powered diagnostic app that helps business owners find operational weaknesses quickly.
Four women, four entry points: the global network, the eight-year-olds, the city’s ecosystem and the product itself. Bush is the only one of the four in the piece quotes.
